Just before half term the Year 12 Geography pupils attended a 3 day fieldwork trip to support their learning for the A level course. On the Tuesday the group headed early in the morning to London for a day of urban fieldwork. Starting at the London Olympic site, the group explored the site for the 2012 Olympics, East Village and Westfield whilst discussing the reasons, impacts and legacy of hosting the event on the local community and country.

They then headed to Kings Cross for lunch to investigate the new rebranding of the station and subsequent urban development in recent years. Using all forms of transport and trying to dodge the showers, they took an Uber Clipper boat to the Docklands from Tower Pier. There the pupils studied the impacts of de-industrialisation in the 1960s and 1970s and the legacy of the redevelopment strategies.

That afternoon they made the long journey to Dorset for the second part of the week. Staying on the Isle of Portland was beautiful when the weather was fair; they had stunning views from the bunkhouse at Portland Bill. The morning was spent undertaking a sand dune transect at Studland bay to view the changes from highwater mark to the climax vegetation of pine woodland. They sheltered in the minibus waiting for the weather to clear and walked up to the iconic Old Harry’s Rocks before heading down off the headland to Swanage in search of an elusive ice cream. Nandos and bowling in Yeovil finished off a wet, long but fulfilling geographical day.

They were blessed with beautiful weather on the Thursday as the journey along the Jurassic coastline continued. Chesil Beach was soon followed by a visit to Lulworth Cove where some of the most incredible geology can be seen. They walked up over the ridge to Durdle Door and finished the trip viewing one of the great landforms in Geography textbooks! A long trip back to Holt concluded around 10pm with a tired yet happy group of pupils. A big thanks to Miss King, Mr Liberman and Mr Atkinson for the driving, geography teaching and everything else to make this possible. It was the first time in a while that the Geography Department had been on a residential trip and they are very much looking forward to next year!